


Various Memories

by man_with_a_face



Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game), Original Work
Genre: Angst, Body Modification, Gen, Goblins, Homebrew, Hurt No Comfort, Memories, Non-Consensual Body Modification, body issues, goblin shit y'know, idk man, just excerpts i've written, just like
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-18 23:28:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29990469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/man_with_a_face/pseuds/man_with_a_face
Summary: I've written a bunch of short stuff for my most recent player character, a goblin named Shuul! Goblin culture is mostly homebrew, so, uh, give it a read!





	1. The Fire and the Elves

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies to anyone still waiting on my other work _Finding Hope_ , I'll hopefully publish the third chapter soon. It's been a draft for a hot minute now, and I just need the motivation to edit it. This is transferred almost completely without other formatting from discord, so apologies if this is disjointed or has poor formatting!

Shuul hurt. They hurt the kind of pain where it radiated everywhere throughout their body, where they didn't know where that pain was coming from. They though it may be coming from their ribs, considering that that was where the guard had kicked them, but they couldn't really be sure. They'd been fighting for what felt like weeks now, but time always had a habit of becoming confusing at times like these-

Days and weeks melded together, names dropped from their mind like sand in a sieve, and events seemed to happen out of order. In fact, they weren't very sure how they'd even gotten here, icy shackles, dragged along by a heavy hand digging itself into their shoddy armor.

They had blood in their eyes. That's what Shuul thought, at least. They couldn't be sure either way, if it was just blurring from being hit on the head one too many times, mixed with the aftershock of seeing too much blood spilt at once.

Oh. They vaguely registered that they were being forced onto their knees now, and are barely aware of the snide remark that passes through their lips- the elves around them seem as tall as redwoods after all, and they were short, even by goblin standards.

The sharp crack of a leather glove across their face barely registers on their deadened, overwhelmed nerves, but it forces their mind to focus once again.

There's three elves around them, not counting the guard (who is being forced to kneel as well, due to height differences). They're all wearing the kind of armor Shuul has only seen on hobgolbins before. Their hair is fancy and well-kept, and all of them have unscarred skin- Shuul is being brought before leadership, then. All of the armor, and none of the prowess. 

Shuul smiles, then winces slightly, the thin cuts on their lips stinging and reopening from the movement. "What," Shuul asks. "Can't even hit me with your own hands? Too used to not dirtying them?"

The three elves sneer at them, before snickering something to each other in Elven. The tallest of the bunch turns to them, and says, "I should have expected that a creature such as you would be incapable of properly speaking even the most simple of languages." They realize they'd been talking with their normal accent, harsh and grating goblin sounds. They make a face and cough blood up onto his fancy fabric shoes, smiling thinly again as they grimace. 

The other elves mutter in elven once again, and the guard grabs them by the back of the skull, banging their head on the ground. Shuul groans as their vision blurs and darkens, sharp whines ringing in their ears. 

"Show some respect to your betters, goblin." The bite on the word 'goblin' still stings, and they think they should have really gotten used to being talked down to by now. Shuul shrugs as best they can with their face pressed to slicked, filthy cobblestone. The guard stands, leaving them to lie prone on the ground.

The elf begins speaking again, babbling about "Using them as a messenger," or somesuch, and Shuul lets their senses sharpen, scanning their surroundings. There's a torch, a few feet away, and all they would have to do is dive between those stick-thin elven legs. Shuul groans and pushes themselves up onto their elbows, and they can hear the elves snicker as they try to get up.

These elves think that they're too stupid to understand what is being said to them. Shuul knows that. Everyone's always hoity-toity to the stunted goblin, who speaks grating Common and fights like they have nothing to lose. Shuul tenses for a moment, then dives past them, whipping around and pressing that torch into the soft finery of their cloaks, the luxuries they surround themselves with while they play at war.

The building goes up like so much kindling.


	2. Karagad Shit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is transferred almost completely without other formatting from discord, so apologies if this is disjointed or has poor formatting!  
> weird fey lord's fucking with their body, angst ensues

Shuul feels like retching, the smell and taste of bile overwhelming their senses. They feel such a disconnect from the creature in the mirror, with long horns and a bloody face. Their body does not feel their own. They feel estranged from themselves, like having their horns taken from them all over again. Somehow, being forcibly given them is worse. Their body is being manipulated against their will, acting in ways they do not recognize. Shuul buries their face in their hands and laughs.

They don’t know what else to do.

* * *

Shuul does not yet know just how monstrous they are. They’ve gone too long unnoticed, looked over, passed by, to ever realize the full terror of their features. 

Now, though? It would be wrong to call them tall, except for by stoutfolk standards, but they are *far* more noticeable. Their nails, which earlier were only half an inch, have grown with the rest of them, sharp and intimidating at over an inch in length. Their gaunt face no longer makes them look sickly and tired, but more so a specter of death, dark cats eyes set deep into the recesses of their face, scars prominent and obvious where they were once able to be looked over. Their horns, still only a third of their full length, are long and dark and twisted, and look like twin knives rising from their skull.

And they are sturdily built, a detail that was undermined by their height, but is now accentuated by it, the strength obvious in their movements. They do not look humanoid, as those in “civilized” society would see it.

Shuul does not know how monstrous they look. But they will learn.


	3. Considerations on Argali

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is transferred almost completely without other formatting from discord, so apologies if this is disjointed or has poor formatting!
> 
> Random memories from their life, not necessarily in order, all having to do w body issues & angst. Title taken from the argali horns my character has.

i.

Rhol’dec has used their horns to control them as long as they can remember. She grabs them with ease, sturdy hands easily slotting into the curve of them, gently (but not too gently) guiding Tuuc away from whatever threat or trouble they’re walking themselves into. It’s usually followed by a small scolding, and then, a brushing aside of their long tangled hair, and a kiss on their forehead. Other kids think that they’re weird for having horns, but since they make a good enough weapon in tussles, others don’t voice that opinion often. Tuuc is small and thin and it is often joked their name should be _Runt_ instead, but they aren’t old enough to know that yet. To process that.

ii.

Shuul does not like this new warband. The hobgoblins act in even stranger ways, and goblins feel no need to even pretend like Shuul is worthy of being seen as a goblin. Bugbears... The less said about them, the better. But. Although other goblins seem willing to recognize their prowess in combat (nobody challenges them to fight, not anymore), they don’t bother playing at politeness. 

Which is probably why, as they’re sharpening their knives, the goblin had tried to attack them. Shuul didn’t know the goblins name, but figured they were probably going after their horns to earn the right to use pronouns. Shuul sighs and kicks at the limp body, making sure they’ve actually killed them. 

They hadn’t really even meant to, the guy had just leapt over the barrels to their right and, without really thinking, Shuul had swung around and heard the sharp *crack* of bone as their dagger embedded itself in their chest. 

They sigh and begun wrapping their knives in fabric, tucking them underneath their breastplate. The priest will want to see their corpse. And maybe they can convince her that goblins need to stop attacking Shuul.

iii. 

When Shuul awakens, everything smells like blood and bile. They feel limp and used up, like a rag used to clean bloodstains one time too many. They have a headache, and an ache behind their eyes, and they ache, they ache, they _ache_. They open their eyes to the priest. She’s sorting through a box of something, and makes eye contact with them. She rises and leaves, the flapping of the tent wafting in the smell of sweet smoke. Shuul doesn’t know if they can cry.

He’d taken their horns. Their defense, their defining feature, the thing they had used to identify themselves for so long. He’d fucking _taken_ them, hadn’t even done the mercy of knocking them out. They remember now, why their arms ache-He’d had two bugbears hold them down, laughing cruelly as they kicked and screamed. He’d gone at it with an axe.

With an _axe_.

Shuul rolls over and heaves again, barely mustering the energy required to wipe their mouth. The bile is thin and full of blood, and they are certain that they were beaten after blacking out. They don’t know how to feel, just acknowledge the ringing hollowness currently overtaking them.

He’d taken their horns.

iv. 

Draarsh does not know what they are seeing. The ground shudders and moves beneath their feet, writhing like snakes. They scramble. They don’t know what else to do. Everyone else is doing the same-Even the hobgoblin that had advanced onto the field, Luxur, was scrambling backwards. _Hobgoblins never retreat_ , they think dully, before a spike of panic gets them moving again. The ground twists and spirals, dirt kicking up and clogging the air. They scramble into a tree, holding onto a branch for dear life. There is a deafening _crack_ as the ground seizes and hardens, transforming into hard stone that cracks in on and moves over itself. The tree they are in shakes and bowed, but remained relatively stable. Then, the world flashes white.

v.

Shuul has always been defined by their deficits. They have red blood. They're small. They get sick, and often. They have horns. Their eyes are yellow, small pools of gold that ~~their mother~~ Rhol'dec whispers to them are beautiful when they hid in her strong arms at night, mumbling about how the other kids think they're weak, cursed, sick, _the runt of the litter_.

Nobody goes so far as to call them cursed, of course. Nobody wants to see a priest slaughter a _schech_.

When they are made into an _huulch_ , the others joke that they are still small enough to be considered a _schech_ , no matter their armor or prowess with a blade and song. They have to put that prowess to use multiple times before they get the respect they know they deserve.

The first time they bleed red blood on the battlefield, crimson spatters onto dull grey sand, and a flood of goblins pulls them back to a priest, clawing and tearing and pulling more blood from them as they go. They are laid over a dying lamb, and as they bleed there, dizzy and head aching from having their horns tugged and slashed and pulled, they know that they can never escape their deficits. 

Small brown and green and blue eyes stare down at them, curious and full of revulsion, the too-strong hands of the priest holding them down, and they _know_.

When they become a part of their new warband, they no longer want to be defined by their flaws. They don't have a choice in the matter.

Goblins find them, covered in crimson blood that is clearly their own, bile staining their torn shirt, tears tracking clear lines down their dirt-stained face, and they know that they will never have a say in the matter.

They are "given" their new name as they perform, a hobgoblin joke that sticks the landing and marks them for the rest of their time there. They are not able to keep the one scrap of their past, the name they'd been able to choose for themself.

Their horns are taken from them before Shaar finds them, and as the priest watches them bleed, she drags them over to a dying livestock, cleaves it open, and forces their small form inside.

She gives a genuine smile when she says she has to mix red with red.

They are small and weak, and imperfect and strange, and _cursed_ , but only by the light of campfire and in the presence of some rather strong drink.

Shuul knows they will always be defined by this, more than they ever have, as they wake up covered in blood that is not their own, with their horns stolen from them, wearing clothes they never wanted and having a name that they have never owned.

**Author's Note:**

> This is transferred almost completely without other formatting from discord, so apologies if this is disjointed or has poor formatting!


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